


Amanita Armillaria

by CactusGhost



Category: Original Work
Genre: Original Character(s), POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-08
Updated: 2019-03-08
Packaged: 2019-11-14 00:16:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18041807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CactusGhost/pseuds/CactusGhost
Summary: When Amanita awakens on the shores of Port Frey, she remembers nothing of her life. She is told she died. She is told she was brought back to life, brought back by some force she does not believe in. Amanita doesn't believe these words. At least, not until she finds a journal with her own handwriting in it.





	Amanita Armillaria

**** It’s dark. Fog hangs heavy over brackish waters where only horrors lurk, and obscures where the equally terrifying creatures of the sky peer down from their treetop lairs. The dim light of bioluminescent fungi just barely revels two sets of feet traversing through the swamp. These nearly-identical sets of boots leave dark prints in the muck as they make their way towards a lonely shack, a solemn affair of mildewed wood and vine, set atop a rickety dock clearly fashioned by whoever lives inside. 

The feet barely make a sound on the rotten wood of the dock as one of the figures, more illuminated now by the light peeking around boards in the wall of the shack, knocks swiftly on the door.

When the wizened old man of the shack finally pries open his front door, the figures are long gone. There’s no sign there had ever even been strangers there. No footprints. No marks.

Nothing, that is, except the bundle of cloth placed delicately on the doorstep, softly breathing. 

  
  


( 1 . ) 

My master, that old fool, disappeared today. I have not much concern of his returning, for even over the last several fortnights he has grown weaker and more frail. I even jested before his departure this night that he is too old to fight the monsters and caimen that love to follow his lantern. But he brushed me off, and now he is gone.

 

Old bastard. 

 

 

 

( 2 . ) 

My master still has not returned, although it has been nearly three nights. What little hope I had for his return is naught now, and if I had any greater level of concern I would attempt to find his corpse in the waters. However, I feel as though something else already has and  _ I  _ at least have the wherewithal to understand my own limits. Naye, he is gone and that is that. 

 

I suppose his shop is mine now, although he never said as much. He never gave me cause to believe he had real family waiting to claim a will, so by my will it is all mine! Hah 

 

With him gone at least I can pursue my own alchemical interests. The old bespawler was too enamored with his crystal solutions to care much for my toadstools. Well caw on him! I’m going to go out and harvest. 

 

 

 

( 6 . ) 

I have created an elixir of healing!

 

As tonight I was scavenging the wastes, I discovered a beautiful bioluminescent red toadstool I had never seen before my eyes. The gills on it dripped a golden liquid that glistened in my lamplight, and it has scales nearly three millimeteres thick! It was an incredible specimen I have decided to name  _ Amanita Armillaria.  _ Armillaria for its bioluminescent properties I have yet to discover the cause of, and Amanita for its undoubted toxicity. I foolishly handled it without my gloves and experienced pains like none other. How wonderful!! I never have felt before a toadstool so incredibly dangerous. I have stumbled upon something glorious. 

 

Despite its heinous toxins, the golden liquid it excretes appears to be full of advanced vitamins, a swab of this elixir healed my pains almost instantly and has continued on, in various experimentations, to cure scrapes, cuts, gouges, coughs, and swampfoot! My clients are very pleased by this new discovery, and I am pleased by the food and money they bring in trade! 

 

I plan to take the week off to forage for more of these _ Amanita Armillaria _ . If I can find where they grow and study their conditions for propagation, perhaps I can grow them in my own compost farm. More to follow. 

  
  


 

( 1 7 . ) 

My discoveries may have led me more astray than I had already encountered. 

Amanita Armillaria are much more toxic than my initial calculations. So much so that the very ground they are created from can only be the ground of deceased magicks. 

 

I found my master that night. 

Hundreds of tiny luminous spores dotted his corpse. His flesh melted into the wet ground and although I could not determine his cause of death one thing to me was made immediately certain. 

 

The mushrooms had started to grow on him while he was still alive.

 

This was a marvelous discovery. For now I have a veritable garden of these glorious spores. Had my hand been more steady, for my excitement was too great, I might have made it out of my encounter without nearly succumbing to their toxins myself. 

 

I had worn my gloves this time. The thickest trollhide pair I owned, but the toxins must be both absorbable through skin and through mucus barriers. I managed to collect but three sample vials of fleshsoil and spores before I blacked out into a week-long haze of agony. My mind ran wild and I have no recollection of what my body did in that time. When I came-to I found myself in a section of wood of which I was unfamiliar. Lucky the stars were out, or I might never have found my way back home. 

 

Next time, I will wear a mask. 

 

 

 

(  4 5  . ) 

 

S o m e t h i n g  i s f o l l o w i n g  m e 

I t  f o l l o w e d  m e h o m e l a s t   ni g h t 

Itwontleavemealone

Itwontleavemealone

Itwontleavemealone

Itwontleavemealone

Itwontleavemealone

Itwontleavemealone

Itwontleavemealone

  
  
  
  


( 5 0 . ) 

Clients today have been unusually nasty. I mourn the loss of the fear they once had in my master, for they do not harbor the same respect to me. They think me a child, but pity on them for I am perhaps the most accomplished alchemist of mine or any time preceding. 

 

My studies with the Amanita Armillaria are coming along well, I have managed to create a small selection of spores in my very own workshop! They take well to high moisture and low light, it appears sunlight has little effect on their rate of growth. As long as I supply them with a significant amount of decomposing magical material, they are lively. 

 

Once I have a large stash of them, I may mass compile healing elixir and poison vials to sell in town. It has been a long time since I have ventured into the public eye, and while I am loathe to do so I am in need of supplies. The wildlife have grown scarce in the area, there must be a new band of hunters catching the rabbits I usually hunt on my own. I must ask the town about these new inhabitants of our area, for although I have not heard tale from any of my clients I know there must be something out there. I have awoken with a bloody mass of bone and feather on my doorstep nearly every day this week.

 

A fools pardon on them, for bone and viscera are two of my favorite things! They cannot scare me. 

 

 

 

( 5 3 . ) 

It has come to my attention that I may be losing consciousness for elongated periods of time. A client today nearly broke down my door in a passion I did not understand, until he berated me with accusations of ignoring his calling. This struck me as odd, for although I would adore nothing more than a quiet life of solitude, that is not the life I live. I have never missed a caller.

 

I wrote him off as a liar, but my mind would not cease questioning his merits, so I wrote letter to six other clients. From several of my favorites I learned that I had indeed been ignoring messengers and housecalls. How peculiar. 

 

I do not remember any coming to call. My memory to myself seems immaculate, each detail of each day a clear delineation of actions. However… 

 

I studied my plants closely, and discovered much more growth than would be expected in my mental timeline of one mere week. Instead, it would seem, I have been unconscious for the better part of a month. My body is fine and my wits about me, I do not sense spell nor curse on my person.

 

The Amanita Armillaria are the only connection I can bridge. I have decided to move them outside the hut and into their own area farther away into the marsh. I was careless to grow them in my rooms. There is clearly something I have not discovered about them yet. 

  
  
  
  


 

(       5 8  . )

I awokkee this mornig in my patch ofamanita amrmiallias. I hav gonet osleep i n my bed but i did not awaken there. Even worssss there was somtnhing in the gardennnnnnnnn. A dark ffigure loomeds over me in my sleep. I know not what it was but i know i tto waaaaantmy deaath. It may even beea thdeath itselllf 

 

I have hidden myself away in my room. I write here from the darkness that envelops everything. I have sent note to all my clients that they should N O T venture to my home. There is something deadly here. All the rabbits are gone. My master is gone. I, too, may be gone. 

 

I am afraid to leave. 

  
  
  


 

( 8 1 . ) 

IAWOKETHISMORNINGWITHBLOODANDFEATHERSINMYMOUTH.

I WAS OUTSIDE AND  afraid

THE MONSTER IS STILL FOLLOWING ME

IT PEERS THROUGH MY WINDOW AT NIGHT

I CANNOT SLEEP

AND YET I SLEEP

MYSKINISTURNINGSLIMYANDROUGH

My darling mushrooms have begun to sprout from my skin. Their beautiful and delicate tendrils drip the most marvelous fluid, that amber panacea that I love. I almost weep at the sight of their tiny gills, so frail but detailed so magnificently. They are the world's most amazing fungi, no, the world's most amazing anything. I am so glad to have them with me always now.

I am so impassioned by their care. I am so glad. So glad they chose  M E . 

 

The figure is here again.

 

It wants my Amanita Armillaria.

I cannot let it have them. 

 

 

 

(               8 4 . ) 

IHaveDecidedToLeave

TheBeastWillNotLeaveMeAloneAndItPutsDeadAnimalsInMyArmsWhenISleep

 

ThisHeinousThing

ThisAwfulPatronOfDeath

 

IfIDoNotLeaveIWillDieItWillKillMeAndMyDiscoveryIsTooImportantToLoseICannotLoseTheAmanitaArmillaria

 

IHaveFashionedAVeilToMyHat…. IfTheBeastCannoySeeMyFaceItWillNotKnowItIsIItNeedsToKill

 

IMustEscape

IMustEscape 

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

MustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape 

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

MustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape 

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

MustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape 

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

MustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape 

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

MustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

IMustEscape

 

I am Amanita

 

 

 

( 2 3 8 . )

 

The Amanita Armillaria are killing me. 

 

 

 

 

(2 3 9 . ) 

 

 

 

 

(2 3 9 . )

  
  
  
  
  
  


 

 

It’s dark. A pair of heavy boots make vague footprints in a vast grassy field that seemingly has no end. Each step feels laborious, like even the act of shuffling across the slick ground is taking all the effort this being has. 

 

The figure lurches and twists unnaturally as it moves. Strangle lumps beneath the fabric of their tattered cloak move seemingly separately from the rest of the body and occasionally, ever so slightly, a reddish glow shines out from between the gaps in the fabric. 

 

They slow, then falter, then stop. The figure seems to just breathe in the scenery for a moment, as if seeing the vastness of open sky for the first time. They fall. 

 

When the youthful party of horse-riding nomads stumble upon the figure, all they see is a grotesque mass of bioluminescent fungi sprouting from the ground. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Backstory for my LARP character Amanita, the half-demon alchemist who died via her own pride.


End file.
